Standard facsimile devices which operate only as facsimile machines connected directly to a telephone line are rapidly being replaced by devices which combined facsimile and/or digital scanning, copying and printing in one single unit. Note, e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,947,345 to Paradise; 3,597,071 to Jones; 5,038,218 to Matsumoto; 5,021,892 to Kita, et al.; and 4,623,244 to Andrews, et al. One class of these devices may conveniently be directly connected to a personal computer or workstation to provide printing, and to a telephone access line to provide facsimile transmission and receipt.
When a multifunction system has multiple job sources (e.g., a telephone line, a printer cable and/or a scanner input), a contention arrangement is required to control access to the system printer. Generally, multiple jobs are placed in a waiting list or queue. There are many ways to prioritize queues, based on time of receipt, job-type, available resources, user codes, etc. U.S. Pat. No. 4,947,345 to Paradise et al. shows one prioritization scheme, which assumes that facsimile messages are usually very important and should receive high priority in the job queues requiring utilizing the printer. Fortunately, the class of multifunction machines in which such features are appearing are increasing in processing power and memory. Job storage is available, to postpone printing until such time as a processor, operating in accordance with a preprogrammed routine, directs a job to a printer. Paradise et al. illustrates a choice of 1) a FIFO printing mode (jobs are printed in the order received) 2) a Hold FAX mode in which only print and copy jobs are printed and 3) a Release FAX mode in which Fax jobs are removed from the main FIFO queue and then directed back to the queue for printing ahead of any copy or print jobs (LIFO). While such a system would work well in some environments, it would not meet all user expectations.
It would be highly desirable to provide a flexible contention management system in which facsimile jobs and print jobs could be selectively chosen for priority printing based on user preference. Additionally, it would be highly desirable to provide a simplified user interface accommodating such selection.
References disclosed herein are incorporated by reference for their teachings.